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Hume Studies Volume 30, Number 1, April 2004, pp. 201-203 XIUSHENG LIU. Mencius, Hume and the Foundations of Ethics. Aldershot and Burlington: Ashgate Publishing, 2003. Pp. vii+204. ISBN 0-7546-0406-3, cloth, $84.95/£47.50. This book compares Hume with Mencius, a fourth-century b.c.e. Chinese Confucian thinker, and according to his introduction, Liu aims to use Mencius and Hume to articulate and defend a particular meta-ethical position. This metaethical position, which he calls "Mencius-Hume moral theory" (MHT), is intended as an improved version of the so-called "sensibility theory" advocated by David Wiggins and John McDowell. The book is thus a work of constructive meta-ethics . However, Liu also resolutely defends particular interpretations of Mencius and Hume. Hence, he may appear to be offering equally a historical study, but for reasons discussed below, the book is less convincing as a historical study and is instead best approached as a constructive enterprise. Since some readers may be unfamiliar with Mencius, a brief introduction is warranted. Mencius is generally considered the second greatest Confucian thinker after Confucius himself. Beginning around the tenth century ce., Mencius's philosophy became the dominant interpretation of Confucianism, and the record of his sayings, the Mencius, was essential reading for all educated Chinese men up until the twentieth century. Mencius famously claims that "human nature is good," in that people innately have "beginnings" or "sprouts" of four virtues: ren, yi, Ii, and zhi (often translated respectively as "benevolence" or "humanity," "righteousness," "ritual propriety," and "wisdom"). These four "sprouts," in turn, consist of certain innate, spontaneous inclinations or feelings: compassion, shame, deference, and approval and disapproval, respectively. Mencius's idea that humans innately incline to compassion, which develops through cultivation into the virtue of "benevolence" or "humanity,"prima facie resembles Hume's discussions of "sympathy" and "humanity." Hence, Liu's comparison of Mencius and Hume is not without grounds. The book contains five chapters. The first focuses on Hume, arguing that "humanity ," which Hume treats in the second Enquiry as the most general principle in human nature and the ground of all moral behavior, is really just "sympathy" from his Treatise, but corrected and made consistent by reason, through appeal to the "general point of view." The second chapter focuses on Mencius and analyzes his conception of ren ("humanity"). Liu argues that, like Hume, Mencius regards "humanity" as the most general principle of human nature and the ground of all virtue. According to Liu, Mencius's philosophy helpfully complements Hume's picture, because Mencius gives more explicit discussion of how humanity underlies Hume Studies 202 Book Reviews and unifies the other virtues, how humanity is cultivated, and how sympathy is the essential human feeling which gives rise to all other characteristically human feelings. Chapter 3 then lays out the basic features of "sensibility theory." Liu considers the complaint that "sensibility theory" is explanatorily circular as the most serious objection against it, and he argues that one can use Mencius's and Hume's conceptions of humanity and human nature to eliminate the circle and rescue the theory from this defect. Next, Liu supplements MHT with an account of Hume's moral epistemology in chapter 4, and with an especially original and insightful argument for reading Mencius as an internalist about moral motivation in chapter 5. Although chapters 1 and 4 focus on Hume, and chapters 2 and 5 on Mencius, readers who take these as historical studies will likely be unsatisfied. For, Liu engages with many rival interpretations of Hume and Mencius, but he often dispenses with these so quickly that one cannot but feel that the competing arguments have not received adequate consideration. Also, Liu's own interpretive stances are sometimes under-supported. For example, Liu frequently follows the famous Confucian commentator Zhu Xi (1130-1200 ce.) in interpreting Mencius, but with little argument. Zhu's relation to Mencius resembles Aquinas's relation to Aristotle. Both Aquinas and Zhu have strong philosophical commitments that greatly influence their interpretations. Aquinas may have understood Aristotle correctly, and likewise Zhu for Mencius. Yet, often their readings are also quite suspect, and so, in a historical study one would normally expect much...

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